


that's how a superhero learns to fly

by thundersquall



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Superpowers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-16
Updated: 2014-11-16
Packaged: 2018-02-24 17:16:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2589728
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thundersquall/pseuds/thundersquall
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Patrick has super speed. It is not as awesome as he'd thought it would be. But he can deal if he's got Jonathan with him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	that's how a superhero learns to fly

**Author's Note:**

> First off, a huge thank you to [ultramarinus](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ultramarinus) for being the most awesome beta ever ;; she took a lot of her valuable time out to help me with this so all the hearts for her <3
> 
> Just to give a little background on this, this is a world where a small percentage of the population are able to use special abilities/superpowers. Most of them go into sports or athletics, but even in sports there aren't that many of them.
> 
> This was set during Kaner's and Tazer's rookie season, 2007-08. I did a bunch of research (because obviously I hadn't even discovered the marvels of hockey then, woe is me), but if I made any mistakes, please do let me know! The sequence of games played and scorelines here are mostly fictional, though some are based on real games/scorelines in that season, so excuse the handwaviness there.
> 
> Title taken from The Script's Superheroes.

Patrick's ability manifested when he was seven years old.

That's actually _really_ young for manifestation; for those with the gene, their abilities don't usually appear before they hit puberty, at the very least. It's why people started calling him 'prodigy', 'special', all the rest of it. Patrick doesn’t think he's anything special, to be honest; so his ability presented much earlier than it was supposed to, but it's not like he's the only one this has ever happened to, for god's sake. Sports are chock-full of these prodigies, hockey as much as any other sport, and even if he presented younger than most other athletes, there are still days when Patrick struggles with his game, when he's unable to avoid checks, times when he goes without scoring for several games in a row. And anyway, the NHL places enough restrictions on athletes with the gene that he can't really use his ability to its full extent, or even very often, during games.

He still remembers the day it manifested, clear as day despite his young age and the passage of years since then.

It had been Christmas, the year he turned seven. He'd been at the rink and playing with Erica and some of his cousins, who'd come to Buffalo for their yearly family Christmas gathering, just knocking the puck around in that uncoordinated, wild way that children of that age do. His side had been down 13-12 (at that age and level, double digit scores weren’t uncommon), and Patrick had been only seven then, but he already knew what it was like to win, and he knew he didn’t like the feeling of not winning.

He'd got the puck off his cousin Ben, and for some reason he'd glanced up at the other end of the ice, at the empty net there. It was too far away for Patrick to skate all the way there on his own without getting checked, and some of his older and larger cousins were already closing in on him.

From somewhere behind, Erica was screaming at him. "Go Patty!" she shouted, her little voice clear and high on the wind. "Patty, come on!"

He didn’t know what she wanted him to do – shoot? skate? pass? – but then he'd looked towards the goal again, and all of a sudden the noise of the rink and the game around him seemed to recede into a low soothing buzz. There was a calmness that suddenly settled upon him, like a warm gentle hand pressed on his tummy, and for one inexorable second it was as if time stood still around him, everything frozen into this one moment, nothing but him and the goal and the ice under his skates.

Patrick moved; he propelled one leg forward on its skate, and looked down somewhat blearily, because he couldn’t understand why he was moving so _slow_. It was as if everything around him had been turned into thick treacle, because that was how it looked like to him, his leg dragging through the air so very slowly, but it didn’t _feel_ slow, somehow, just looked it. It felt perfectly normal, like he was moving and skating normally, but when he watched his own movements, they seemed painfully slow. Everything was still and frozen around him.

He continued moving, skating towards the goal, moving the puck with him easily; any moment now, he thought, his cousins would catch up, take the puck off him, maybe score another goal, and Patrick just couldn’t let that happen. So he tried to skate faster, pushing the puck ahead of him, sometimes having to detour to the sides when he pushed it too hard and it swerved the wrong way over the sloping ice; but his cousins never caught him, and Patrick was too focused on moving forward to look back and check where they were.

He reached the goal, finally, and triumphantly tapped the puck into the net, before turning around with his little arms in the air, ready to yell about how great his goal was, how both their teams were now level.

What he hadn’t expected was for the world to come back to him in a rush, loud and vociferous and insistent – it was as if everything exploded into noise and movement around him, and only then did he realize how oddly silent and still it had been, the last couple of minutes when he'd been moving. And he realized something else, too: Erica and his cousins were still at the other end of the rink, exactly where he'd left them, positions not even changed. Ben was still where he'd been when Patrick had hooked the puck off the end of his stick, standing with his hands wrapped around his stick and staring foolishly at Patrick, legs spread apart in the exact same pose he'd been in.

All of them were staring at him, mouths open in something like shock, horror, amazement; Patrick couldn’t _understand_ what was going on. He lowered his arms slowly.

"What?" he called to them, and then glanced to the stands where their parents had been sitting and chatting while watching the children. "I scored! Did you guys see that?"

Patrick's mother was out of her seat before he'd finished talking, striding across the rink in just her boots, no skates, and it made her slip and slide but somehow she managed to keep her balance until she reached him. She scooped him up once she got up to him, holding him close, pressing her nose into his cheek, and Patrick was alarmed; his mother didn’t pick him up often now that he was getting so big and heavy. Then he got scared, because his mother was making funny hiccupping noises, and when he managed to pull back to look at her face she was crying and laughing at the same time.

"Mom? What's going on?" he asked, wriggling a little, gripping her coat with his small fists, starting to feel really, _really_ scared.

"Oh, honey," his mom said. "You special, special boy." And she'd held him tighter, and continued to cry and laugh in that weird way.

___

 

It’s a story Patrick's never told anyone. Firstly, people would never ask, anyway, because asking someone to detail how their abilities manifested is kind of rude, something like the equivalent of touching someone you didn’t know. Also, Patrick's never felt comfortable talking about his ability in the first place. He's had enough of sports pundits, journalists, and practically everyone from coast to coast implying that Patrick Kane only made it big in the NHL because of his ability, never mind that NHL rules meant that he couldn’t deploy it more than once each period of a game, or that opposing teams had plenty of people with abilities that could counter Patrick's, and weren’t as shy about using them as Patrick was. And because he can't – doesn’t – talk about it, he can't explain that his ability gives him no unfair advantage; he's naturally fast in the first place, and there's no middle ground or slow start with his power, once he unleashes it he moves so fast that other people don't even have time to so much as blink. It just doesn’t bleed through into his normal life, it's never able to _trickle_ out when he's on the ice to amp up his natural speed a bit, but people never seem to believe or be able to grasp that.

It had been a problem throughout his life: people staring at him in surprise when they first saw him, remarking to his parents or coaches, "He's so small. Are you sure he's okay to play?" Patrick would play twice as hard when there were people like these around, dying to prove them wrong, stickhandling prettily and slipping between people on the ice like an eel, until their mouths would drop open and they'd nod and agree yes, yes, that small kid can _really_ play. But of course, once they find out what his ability is, all that's shot to shit, as if the fact that Patrick's naturally slippery with the puck has nothing to do with how good he plays. It's always about his fucking ability and what an advantage that must give him, and people shooting him suspicious looks when he insists he doesn’t deploy it on the ice ("If you don't, then how are you so fast all the time?" one kid whom Patrick had beaten multiple times had demanded loudly), and Patrick hates it so fucking much.

"It's a surprising choice by the Chicago Blackhawks, picking Patrick Kane as the first overall pick," one commentator had said at his draft. "He's so small – 5'10, 160 pounds, certainly not built for the NHL. Do you think his size will be a problem?"

"It could be, but not with that ability of his," the other commentator had said. "He could easily score a hat trick per game, if he deployed it to the maximum of once each period, as per NHL regulations. There's not much goaltenders or D-men can do against a unique ability like his."

Patrick had watched that segment after his draft, hating his ability, hating everything. He _hadn’t_ made it to the NHL because of his fucking special ability, no matter what anyone thought; he'd made it because he'd been playing hockey since he was two, because his father had made him practice stickhandling for hours on end, sometimes until he'd cried from the ache in his fingers and wrists, because his parents had sacrificed all their time and money to develop his interest in hockey, to drive him to games in junior leagues, to buy him the best equipment and give him the best coaches they could afford, all so that one day Patrick might be able to be drafted into the NHL. And he'd totally defied all expectations; he was first overall pick, drafted by an Original Six team, and it was all because he'd worked hard for it, and his parents had worked just as hard to nurture his budding talent.

And then, of course, when he began playing for real, there came the times when he couldn’t score just due to bad luck or a bad team play, when he refused to or couldn’t deploy his ability for whatever reason or other (Fleury is the fucking worst, really, what sort of goalie has the ability to expand himself so much so that he can entirely block the mouth of the goal? _No one_ can score when he does that, not just Patrick. It's just another reason Patrick hates playing against the Pens); and then the pundits and journalists would come down hard on him, berating him for not using what was given to him, calling him selfish, temperamental, out of control.

There are days when Patrick really hates his fucking ability. Basically, he's screwed if he uses it, gets all sorts of sly insinuations about how he'd never have made it in the NHL if he didn’t have this power to help him put the puck in the net, as if Patrick's fucking _hands_ alone aren’t able to do that, and they are, thank you very much; but if he doesn’t or can't use it, he gets called names like _the Blackhawks' problem child_.

He's just fucked both ways. And then he meets Jonathan Toews.

___

 

Well, to be accurate, he meets Jonny even before all this had happened, before Patrick started being a fixture in Chicago tabloids for his _out-of-control temperament_ and _lack of team spirit_. But even then, when they'd first met in junior leagues as preteens, and then throughout the next few years when they'd bumped into each other on and off at hockey camps, found themselves attending the Blackhawks prospect camp together, nervous and excited and the feeling of _hey, maybe this is real, maybe we can make it to the NHL together_ prickling in their veins, and then actually, finally, playing together in their rookie year, in the actual fucking NHL, with the Chicago Blackhawks, Patrick already knew Jonny's the kind of guy he wishes he can be – calm and focused, scarily talented with a stick and puck, and most of all, not ashamed of his own ability, not afraid of using it.

He'd known Jonny had the gene a few years after the first time they met, because Jonny had told him himself, so open and confident about it, never feeling the need to hide.

They were both 13 years old and playing on the same team for the first time ever, and they'd seen each other around for a while, so they'd sort of become casual friends, the hi-and-bye sort whenever they ran across each other. That day, they'd played together on the same line, and it had gone fantastically well; even at that age they'd had chemistry on the ice, and they played passes off each other like it was the most natural thing in the world, somehow knowing exactly where the other would be and what they would do. Patrick had never been so buzzed in his life after a game, vague thoughts about how he'd finally found a _partner_ who could keep up with him, ability or no ability, floating through his mind.

Jonny had skated up to him and knocked their fists together. "Great game!" he'd shouted at Patrick, and Patrick had laughed, pulled off his helmet and then Jonny's, and grabbed him into a hug. His forehead had pressed into Jonny's for a moment, before he yelped a little and pushed him away. Jonny was – hot, shockingly so; not quite hot enough to burn, but definitely enough to surprise, his body temperature far higher than any fever.

"Oh, yeah," Jonny had said, looking sheepish, rubbing his forehead with a gloved hand. "Sorry, should have mentioned earlier – it's my gene, you see – "

Patrick's eyes widened and he'd skated closer. "Gene? You mean the MT gene?"

"Yeah," Jonny said. "Wait – you have it, too?"

Patrick nodded reluctantly, after a moment. He wished he could lie to Jonny. He didn’t want to lie, but he knew that after Jonny found out, he'd be like the other kids, think that Pat cheated in games, that he had an unfair advantage, and he might be pissed, because that would just tell Jonny that their awesome victory earlier was basically due to Pat cheating with his ability, even though he _didn’t_. But he didn’t know if Jonny would believe him if he told him so.

"That is so cool," Jonny said, mouth dropping open. "Wow, Pat! That's really cool! We both have the gene!"

"Yeah," Patrick said, desperately thinking of something else to say, how to change the topic so that Jonny wouldn’t ask him about it. But –

"Come on, Pat," Jonny said, throwing an arm around him. He didn’t feel so hot under the layers of pads he had on, but Patrick knew that his bare skin would be burning hot, like how his patch of forehead had felt to Patrick earlier. "Listen, I'll tell you mine, and you tell me yours, okay?"

Patrick looked up into Jonny's earnest, excited face, and sighed. "I have super speed and agility," he said softly, looking down again so he wouldn’t have to see Jonny when he absorbed this information. "I can – move really fast, fast enough that people can't see me – and I can move around or between obstacles at high speed. That's it. That's all."

He tried to sound noncommittal, like it wasn’t a big deal, but all Jonny did was let out a long breath. "Wow, Pat," he said, sounding absolutely reverent, and when Patrick dared to sneak a glance at him, Jonny was staring at him, looking – not angry, or suspicious, but awed. "Patrick, that's really cool, you know? That's like, pretty damned awesome."

Patrick shoved him a bit, the tension in his chest easing gently. "You're kidding."

"No, I swear." Jonny looked kind of dazed. "I think it's cool. You're like the Flash." He tightened his arm around Patrick. "You know what, I always liked the Flash. Always wished I had his ability. Even though mine's pretty cool too."

"What's yours?" Patrick asked quickly, grasping at the out before Jonny could change his mind about thinking _his_ ability was amazing, when it really wasn’t, not when it brought Pat nothing but trouble.

Jonny drew himself up to his full height – half a head taller than Patrick – and announced proudly, "I'm a firestarter."

"A what?"

"Here." Jonny pulled off a glove, shoved it and his stick to Pat. "Hold these, will you?"

Patrick did, and then he watched, fascinated, as Jonny held his hand out palm up, squinted at it in a way that made Patrick want to laugh, because the look on Jonny's face was so intense and focused, like it was during a game, except now he was just staring into his own hand. But then there was a sudden spark, and a bright yellow flame erupted from Jonny's palm, dancing just above the skin like a sinuous snake.

Jonny closed his hand gently into a fist after several seconds, and the flame extinguished. "There," he said, looking triumphant.

Patrick let out a breath he didn’t know he'd been holding. "Jonny," he said, turning a bright grin onto him, "Jonny, Jonny. That is _so_ cool, okay. Like, beyond cool."

"Really?" Jonny asked, grinning back. "You really think so?"

"So much better than mine," Patrick said, nodding fervently. And he really did think so – it must be great to have an ability that looked so awesome, that didn’t affect games as directly as his did, so people would believe he could play well because he was just that good, not because he was a firestarter.

"No way," Jonny scoffed. "Yours is way better."

Patrick shook his head. "No – " he began, but Jonny tugged him closer against his side, knocking their heads together companionably. Patrick still remembers how the side of his head had felt like it was blazing just from that small point of contact, but not in a painful way, more like a warm, comforting way.

Jonny said, "Trust me", in a tone that brooked no argument, staring at Patrick with his sharp, intense eyes, and Patrick could only nod when faced with a Jonny like that.

"Good," Jonny said, satisfied, and he let go of Patrick to go skate across the rink and find the game puck, which he brought back to where Patrick was waiting for him.

He traced across it with a finger, squinting and concentrating, and the smell of burnt rubber reached Patrick, so he knew Jonny was burning words into it. When he was done, he handed it to Patrick, and Pat took it, turning it over carefully in his gloved hands. One side read _Firestarter_ , and the other _The Flash_ , and along the rim Jonny had burned the date: _11/24/2002_.

"There," Jonny said, looking satisfied. "Keep it, okay? So you'll always remember today, and our first game together."

Patrick clenched the puck so tightly in his hand that he could feel it pressing into his palm, through his glove, and right then and there in that moment, he felt on top of the world, and he wished as hard as his 13-year-old heart could wish, that one day he'd always be able to play with Jonny.

___

 

And he _does_ , six years later, and it's perfect, because with Jonny on his line, slipping him those perfectly-threaded passes or tapping in the ones Patrick sends him, working seamlessly together like they're telepathic, Patrick can almost forget that he has this ability that everyone believes gives him an unfair advantage in the NHL.

And Jonny never makes any suggestions about Pat using his ability; whenever he does use it, Jonny just grabs him into a hug after the game, like he'd done when they were thirteen, like he does for every single game, and tells him he's done good, and adds, "You were so cool out there, so fucking awesome, you always are – " and Patrick can forget, at least until the next article comes out, saying the usual shit about how Pat should be banned from using his speed at the highest level, how the Hawks are dominating because of that, like all the other guys on the team and their talents and skills mean fucking nothing at all.

And Patrick is 19 years old, and he's going to play with Jonny for at least the next three glorious years, and they're going to win the Stanley Cup for Chicago and fill up the UC, fuck the haters, and he's in love with Jonathan Toews.

____

 

He's learned to put it out of mind. They're close, always have been; _the faces of the franchise_ , everyone calls them, the driving force behind the rejuvenation of hockey in Chicago, and PR totally cashes in on it, arranging interviews and photoshoots and practically everything for them together. So – there's nothing really wrong between buddies, is there, if sometimes they look or touch just slightly more than is necessary?

They still fight like shit sometimes, though, no matter how close they are; it comes with the territory, Patrick thinks, of being so good on the ice that they can never outpace each other, of living in each other's space for months on end while sharing hotel rooms on road trips. There were those nights when they were on the road and Patrick was homesick, upset about games, angry about the media, and Jonny had sighed and lifted the blanket and said _fucker, come in, or we'll both never get any rest_ , and Patrick had gratefully burrowed under it and pressed himself against Jonny, hot and comforting, and they'd sometimes end up with an arm or leg over each other, even. But when you're that close, you can't avoid getting into arguments about things like Jonny's untidiness in the room, or Patrick being too loud when it's late and Jonny's trying to sleep.

Jonny's got a temper to match his ability, and sometimes when he gets pissed enough, his skin actually starts to brighten and glow, like his entire body's lighting up from within, and he's going to turn into a human fireball at any moment (and in fact Jonny had confessed that it had happened a handful of times before, him exploding into a bright burst of fire until he got his temper under control – only to end up naked because he'd flamed his clothes right off). It fascinates Patrick, really, the thought that Jonny might be able to go up in actual flames, and Sharpy and Burish and he himself keep pushing it, wanting to see that glorious moment Jonny finally, literally explodes.

And to be honest, the way the fiery glow makes Jonny's skin radiate heat and light, how it endows the tips of his dark hair with gold, it's really kind of fucking hot, in more ways than one (and Patrick can't help but give himself a good mental pat on the back for thinking that one up). Patrick finds Jonny attractive at the worst of times, really, even when he's just stripped down to his underarmour after a game, sweaty and stinking and red in the face from exertion, but when Jonny's pissed enough to get that glow – well, it sort of transforms Jonny from merely handsome to pretty fucking damned beautiful, in Patrick's opinion. Not that he'd ever tell Jonny that.

But here's the thing: when he's with Jonny, playing with Jonny, his ability, the papers, everything just doesn’t seem to matter as much to Patrick. What matters are Jonny's hot hugs, his wide grins when Pat creates a particularly sweet assist, the way he yells at Patrick about how _he's the fucking best_ when he unleashes his power and has the puck in the net before anyone in the arena's even had time to move.

Patrick can take what they have now: this easy, uncomplicated friendship, chirping back and forth, Jonny's unabashed respect and admiration for him _and_ his stupid ability. It makes him breathe easier and sleep better at night when new articles come up about him and Jonny clenches his fist and says things like, "They have no fucking right to say that about you, they don't even _know_ you, they have no idea how hard you fucking _work_ \- " skin glowing bright gold, and Patrick loves him so hard in those moments his chest hurts, but he can take this and not ask for more.

He doesn’t think Jonny feels the same way about him, not really. Sometimes, though, he wonders; like when Jonny sometimes looks at him in a certain way and for a beat too long, eyes dark and somehow considering, or when he turns his head in their shared hotel room and catches Jonny staring at him instead of the TV, or when Jonny sits too close to him at dinner, thigh burning hot against his, or the touches and hugs that sometimes linger a second longer than Patrick feels they should have.

___

 

He wonders, again, during a match with the Habs. It's an ugly game from the start; the Habs are going all out, taking advantage of their physicality to throw the Hawks off their rhythm and prevent them from playing their puck possession game. It's not even halfway into the second period and Patrick already feels bruised all over, wrung out in a way he seldom feels during matches. He's been slammed up against the boards and posts more times than he can count; taken a puck to his hip and a stick to his back.

Patrick usually tries to stay away from the boards; he knows he's smaller, he can't match up to the physical size and brute strength of most players in the NHL, so he relies on his (natural) speed to get himself and the puck through traffic. But the Habs aren’t letting up on him this game, checking him each time he's got the puck, stifling his play, and Patrick's never felt more ineffective in his life.

"You all right?" Jonny asks him in a low voice, during the second period intermission, when they're in the locker room. Patrick nods, trying not to wince when he stretches himself. There's an achy soreness at his hip, and he knows it's going to develop into a truly spectacular, painful bruise by tonight.

"Listen," Jonny says. "If you need to use it, just go ahead. I'll cover you."

Patrick shrugs, not responding. He doesn’t really know why he hasn’t used his ability yet, despite them already being 3-1 down. Jonny is looking at him shrewdly, and Patrick knows he's thinking of the article he caught Patrick reading on his laptop last night in their hotel room – the one from the Sun-Times discussing their last match against the Avalanche. They'd lost by the awful scoreline of 7-4, at home no less, and Patrick had unleashed his ability thrice for the first time ever in a game and hadn’t been able to score more than once, thanks to Liles' ability to turn himself into an actual fucking _brick wall_ which he'd pitched up in front of their goalie. Patrick would have laughed, if he hadn't felt so pathetic, bouncing off that wall twice out of three times. And then of course, there was that dumb article basically just saying Patrick was fucking useless, even with his super speed, and – yeah. He's trying to tell himself that's not the reason why he hasn’t yet used it this game, but Jonny's staring at him with his laser eyes that seem like he can peel Patrick open and read his damn brain.

"You know you never have to use it, if you don't want to, or if you don't feel the need to," Jonny continues quietly. "I'm just saying. If you do, you know I got your back. Fuck everyone else. You're not obligated to anyone."

"Okay," Pat manages, and that's all they say for the rest of the intermission, just sitting silently next to each other and downing Gatorade.

The third period starts, and it's just as ugly as the first two. Patrick gets checked twice in the first minute of his first shift on the ice, and the second time Bouillon slams hard into him, he falls over on his skates and faceplants into the ice.

"Yeah, just stay there, Kane," Bouillon sneers from above him. "Hockey isn’t for someone like you, get it? No place for little cheaters in this game."

Rage – sudden, searing rage – fills Patrick's belly.

He hauls himself upright, almost dizzy with the anger pounding through him, and withdraws into that calm centre within him, to grasp hold of his power.

It comes over him as it always does – the world falling away around him, the dreamlike way he moves, as if through a lake of treacle. Everything is silent. Everything is still. It's just Patrick and the puck, and he has time. Lots and lots of time. Time enough for him to move up to Carey Price, frozen in front of the net, and poke the puck into it, as casually as if he's taking a stroll in the park.

He exhales, then, drawing his power back in, and the world returns in that same disorienting loud rush that it had when he was seven. The linesman looks at the puck and gives his signal, the goal horn sounds, and then Jonny is skating over to him, yelling himself hoarse, before he barrels into Patrick and wraps his arms around him in a wonderfully suffocating hug. Jonny is as hot as always, under all his layers; on an impulse, Pat pulls his glove off with his teeth and lets it drop to the ice, and wraps his hand around the back of Jonny's neck, at the patch of bare skin just beneath his helmet.

Jonny feels like he always does – wet with sweat, burning hot under Patrick's palm, just nudging at the edge of temperature where he'd be hot enough to burn Pat. Patrick just holds him and lets the heat sink into him. Jonny is staring at him, arms still tight around his waist, and there's that look in his eyes, that burning intent look that makes Pat wonder: what exactly does Jonny think of him, of them, like this?

The moment's broken when Bouillon skates over, the sneer still on his face, twisted with anger. "I knew it," he shouts at Patrick. "You're only able to score because of a gene, fucking cheat."

Jonny's off Patrick and up in Bouillon's face before Patrick can even react. "You wanna repeat that, fucker?"

Bouillon turns his head to spit, and then says something to Jonny in French, something Patrick can't understand but makes Jonny's face turn a dark shade of puce, which rapidly lightens to – shit – a soft golden glow.

Patrick can tell Jonny is about half a second away from throwing his gloves down and beating Bouillon to a pulp. And while Patrick wouldn’t be opposed to that, the problem is, when Jonny starts glowing like this, his body temperature goes through the roof; if he touches Bouillon with his bare hands he'll probably cook him right through, and the NHL is going to suspend his ass for maybe the next thousand games – there are strict rules against injuring other players with your abilities, never mind that it's not Jonny's problem that his body burns up even when he wants to get into a simple fistfight.

He reaches out and grabs Jonny's jersey, careful not to press into him, and tugs. "Hey," he says, quietly. "Let it go."

"I'm not letting go what he said about you," Jonny snarls, eyes still fixed on Bouillon, who – to Patrick's satisfaction – appears to be slowly inching backwards at the sight of Jonny ready to explode into flames. No one wants to mess with a firestarter.

"Let it go _now_ ," Patrick says firmly, tugging at him again. "Thrash the shit out of them the rest of the period, and then you can flip Bouillon off at the end of it."

A tense few seconds tick by – referee hovering nervously nearby – but then Patrick sees Jonny visibly relax, body slumping in his pads, the fiery glow on his skin ebbing away until he's back to his usual tan.

"I got it," he tells Patrick, then levels his gaze back on Bouillon and shouts something back to him in French, something that makes Bouillon turn positively red with anger. Jonny pointedly turns his back on him and gives Patrick a quick one-armed hug.

"Thanks," he says, and Pat just looks up at him and grins.

Jonny takes only seven minutes to score one to bring them level, of course he does. He lurks in the crease in front of the goal, and when he sees Sharpy racing up the wing with the puck, he rips off a glove and presses a palm to the ice.

Patrick's seen him do this many times before, but it never fails to amaze him, the speed with which Jonny lights up and conjures his fires, the way he controls where and how the heat spreads. The ice around him melts rapidly in a circle until the surface is a slick wash of water except for the spot where Jonny is standing; the Habs players around Jonny slip and fall on their asses, unable to skate or balance with the layer of water over the ice rendering their skate blades useless; Sharpy shoots the puck right at Jonny, and just before the puck hits the watery surface, Jonny reaches out with his stick and taps it home, easy as winking, past a flailing and unbalanced Price.

It's beautiful. Jonny is beautiful. He stands there, in the midst of a bunch of Habs players in various states of disarray on the watery ice, like he's on his own fucking island and these people are bowing around him, and raises his stick in triumph.

Patrick laughs and laughs.

___

 

Patrick might get a little drunk after the game, which they win in OT with a gorgeous wraparound goal from Buff.

They celebrate at the hotel bar with shots, the guys slyly sneaking drinks to the rookies until Patrick is dizzy with it, leaning heavily against Jonny, into his comforting heat, and then Jonny is dragging him up, holding him tight around his waist, as steady as a stone pillar. Of course Jonny would turn out to be better at holding his drink than Patrick, who is shamefully quite a lightweight.

"I'm getting Kaner into bed," Jonny says, and Patrick's pretty sure he didn’t mean it to come out sounding the way it sounds to him now, because suddenly, all he fucking wants is for Jonny to do _exactly_ that.

Burish wolf whistles behind them. "Use protection!" he shouts, to a background of catcalling, which, well, perhaps Patrick wasn’t so drunk that he was the only one who'd heard it _that_ way.

Jonny flushes, but he doesn’t take his arm away from Patrick, holds him all the way to the elevators and up to their room. Patrick isn’t too drunk to walk, but he sure as hell milks it for all it's worth, leaning into Jonny and clinging on like a limpet, unable to stop the surge of want that suddenly rises in him.

He wants to press his entire body to Jonny's, drown in his heat and fire, he wants to clutch at Jonny like this forever, he wants to kiss Jonny, touch Jonny, love Jonny. He wants, oh god, he _wants_ -

Jonny's got the door open and gently nudges him in, kicking the door shut and then tugging Patrick over to the bed nearest the door, laying him down in it. "Hey," he says softly, putting a hand on Patrick's cheek, and without really thinking Patrick nuzzles into the heat there, turning his head a little to press his lips to the palm.

It's the first time he's had his lips anywhere on Jonny's skin. It's dry and hot like the rest of him, burning into Patrick's lips. There were all those nights when they slept in the same bed, all but cuddling, and most of the time Jonny was in nothing but boxer briefs, his skin heated against Pat's arms and legs, but Patrick's still never got to put his lips on Jonny's bare skin.

Jonny's breath hitches a little. Pat doesn’t think he's too drunk to have imagined that.

"Hey," Jonny says again, and this time his voice is ever so slightly rougher. "Pat, are you okay?"

Patrick dimly realizes that Jonny only really calls him Pat or Patrick when they're in private. In public and in front of the guys, Jonny calls him Kaner, or sometimes the excruciatingly cute nickname of Peeksy. Jonny gets a shitload of ribbing from the guys for it, but he still keeps on calling him that. Patrick honestly doesn’t know if he just gets off on Patrick's annoyance (and his annoyance is just for show anyhow, he'll never admit it out loud but he _loves_ Jonny calling him a stupidly cutesy pet name), or if he somehow knows that Patrick, well, likes it.

Jonny's still staring at him, and Patrick realizes he expects an answer. He opens his mouth to tell him yeah, he's fine, but what comes out is "I want to kiss you so fucking badly."

And in that moment, Patrick's grateful for the amount of alcohol in his system: enough to keep his inhibitions low and any sense of shame buried, not enough for him to be so drunk he won't remember any of this, because Jonny _swallows_ and his eyes grow hot, and yeah, Pat definitely wants to remember this.

"Can I?" he asks, licking his lips. Jonny's eyes follow the movement, the way he slicks his tongue over his bottom lip, running it from corner to corner like he always does.

"Fuck," Jonny says, only it comes out so low and choked that it sounds more like a puff of air than an actual word. "Yeah. Patrick, yeah – yes." And then he just surges forward like he's been shot out of a cannon, and presses his lips to Patrick's, going right in, kissing dirty and wet like he's been aching for this.

Jesus. Patrick just goes completely boneless under him, legs falling open, until Jonny slides a thick thigh between his legs and presses it upwards, and – oh – it's also pressing in rather interesting ways into a rather interested part of Patrick's body.

He feels completely overwhelmed by sensation; Jonny is so warm over him, bracketing him with his body, his hand still on Patrick's cheek, and Patrick feels like he could be burnt, except that the heat isn’t even uncomfortable in the least. It's just a warmth he can bury himself in forever, and it's all Jonny. And Jonny's tongue is licking over his lips, tangling with his; it's hot there too, and they've barely started kissing but Patrick knows his lips are going to be ruined, red and swollen from the heat of Jonny's mouth. And then there's Jonny's thigh, fucking firm and strong, thick with muscle against his cock, and Patrick can't help grinding down into it, gasping against Jonny's lips.

"Oh god, Pat," Jonny says, and shifts a little so he can push his own cock into Patrick's hip, right where the puck had got him earlier, the spot that was already a dark purple-blue when Patrick had showered after the game. Patrick almost shouts, his entire body curling in upon itself before unfurling again, trembling against Jonny and whining into his mouth, his cock suddenly harder than he's ever felt it.

Jonny hesitates, pulls back from Patrick to look down at him, and Patrick just – moans, grasping helplessly at Jonny's shirt to pull him back, hips working restlessly against Jonny's thigh.

"Oh god," Jonny repeats, and it's like sex makes both him and Patrick too stupid for words or thoughts or something. "You like it, fuck, you actually _like_ this – "

He grinds his cock into the bruise again, a slow dirty roll of his hips, and Patrick shudders and cries out and digs his fingers into Jonny's arms.

"I really – I want to blow you," Jonny says abruptly, and Patrick's eyes fly open, because _wow_ , no matter how gay their cuddling previously and the grinding now has been, that's something he'd never thought he'd hear Jonathan Toews say. "Let me – Patrick, I want to blow you."

Patrick tries to open his mouth to say _hell yes_ , but what comes out instead is an embarrassingly throaty moan, so instead he just drops his hands to his pants and unbuckles his belt shakily, undoes the button, tries to push them down without needing to move from Jonny's body. Jonny, however, moves down Patrick's body until he's settled between his legs, and he just yanks Patrick's pants off, belt and all, with one arm. Patrick tries not to moan at how hot that is.

Jonny doesn’t even bother taking his briefs off, just goes right in and mouths at the hard outline of Patrick's cock through the black fabric, and Patrick's hips jerk up uncontrollably.

"Relax," Jonny says, as if anyone can relax with a mouth on their dick, Christ, and then he places his hands on Patrick's inner thighs and spreads them open wider with a push. The next time Patrick manages to look down, all he can see are Jonny's broad shoulders between his spread legs, muscles bunching up under his fitted shirt, his head lowered as he licks at Patrick's cock, straining against his briefs.

_Fuck._

Jonny noses at the slit in his briefs, and then – fuck, _fuck_ \- he licks into it, flicks the tip of his tongue against the head of Patrick's cock, heavy and swollen, and his tongue is fucking hot, way above body temperature. Patrick can't help but whine at that first contact; he wants to run his hands through Jonny's hair, hold his head steady and fuck up into his mouth, but – he doesn’t really know what to do with his hands, to be honest, what exactly is good blowjob etiquette for a first time between best friends-roomies-teammates or whatever it is he's got going on with Jonny? So he settles one on Jonny's shoulder and brings the other up to his mouth in a fist so he can bite into his knuckles and hopefully muffle any more sounds threatening to burst out of him.

Jonny's tonguing him with purpose now, through the slit in his briefs, working his tongue raspy-rough over the swollen head of Patrick's cock. Just when Patrick's thinking that he might not be above begging for Jonny to just take his briefs off and get with the program of sucking, Jonny pulls back, long enough to just twitch the fabric of his boxers apart, and his cock practically springs through the slit. It's leaking at the tip, fucking _wet_ , and Patrick doesn’t even know if it's because of his own precome or Jonny's licking. And then – as he watches, his breath coming in little shuddery gasps - Jonny flicks his eyes up at him, grins, and runs his tongue all around the sensitive head once before just swallowing him down.

Patrick is not prepared for the heat of Jonny's mouth, but it doesn't hurt; it's just this incredible sensation of his dick being held in a tight, wet, _hot_ furnace. He cries out involuntarily and bites harder into his fist, only for Jonny to pull off, fucking _again_ , the damn cocktease, and tug his arm away. "Don't," he says. "I want to hear you." And before Pat can react, he's sucking Patrick's cock into his mouth again, tongue fluttering against the underside, and Patrick – Patrick forgets whatever he wanted to say, his bitten hand dropping to the sheets of the bed, clenching and rucking it up something good.

Jonny can't take him all the way in, but he doesn’t bother with using his hand, just fits his mouth snugly around Patrick's cock and sucks as hard as he can. It's sloppy and wet and Jonny keeps swallowing, trying to swallow his spit down except he can't do it fast enough and there's spit all over his lips and chin. And each time he swallows his mouth just clenches around Pat, and oh shit, oh shit, there's only so much sensation Pat can take when Jonny adds his tongue into the equation, swirling it around Patrick's cock in his mouth.

"Jonny," he chokes, hips flying up and driving his dick hard into Jonny's mouth; Jonny chokes out a wet sound as well but to his credit, he doesn't stop, doesn't let up, just sucks Patrick down like he's in some kind of competition. It's just like Jonny to act like cocksucking is something he has to win championship trophies in too, Patrick thinks somewhat hysterically. He's sort of aware he's babbling, saying things like _so good, Jonny, yes, take my dick_ , but whatever, if Jonny likes to hear encouragement then Pat's going to give it to him and make sure he wins all the awards in oral.

His balls are tightening in that familiar way and he pushes with his hand, still on Jonny's shoulder, dimly trying to warn him, be polite, but all Jonny does is moan around his cock, lips stretched obscenely wide on it and drooling onto the fabric of Patrick's boxers. It's the hottest thing Patrick has ever seen. He feels ready to explode, hips jerking roughly and pistoning his cock in and out of Jonny's mouth like they have a life of their own, like his own body isn’t under his control anymore. He's so fucking close just watching Jonny suck about half his cock, not even deepthroating him, not even jerking him to help him along. Jonny moves a hand to Patrick's hip, right where the bruise is, and slides it into the leg of his briefs until his hand is on his bruise. He's not applying any pressure, but the shocking heat of his hand on the tender spot makes Patrick twist under him, moaning and shivering, every nerve in him on fire.

"Oh my god," Patrick gasps, feels his stomach tighten in on itself, pleasure pooling hot and needy in it. "Jonny, Jonny, fuck, make me come, please, just make me come, I need to – "

And then Jonny _presses_ the heel of his palm into the bruise, a sharp shard of pain at Patrick's flesh, everything intensified by how hot Jonny's skin is, and Patrick fucking shoots everything he's got right into Jonny's mouth while his body simultaneously tries to twist away from and into the sweet wild pain of Jonny's hand against his bruise.

Jonny swallows. Jonny swallows it all down, and when he pulls off Patrick's dick with an obscene pop, he licks at the corners of his mouth to get whatever he'd missed, and leans in to mouth at Patrick's softening cock as if he doesn’t ever want it out of his mouth.

Patrick shakes and shudders and tries to get himself together enough to speak, tugging weakly at Jonny's shirt until Jonny gets the message and climbs back on top of him, body heavy and hot. Patrick grasps his face, stroking his thumbs across the blades of Jonny's cheekbones. Jonny's eyes are wild with need, and Patrick kisses him hard, biting into Jonny's lower lip, tasting himself all musky inside Jonny's mouth.

"Pat," Jonny pants, pulling away from Patrick's mouth, and his voice is all scratched up just from _sucking Patrick's cock_. "I need – "

"Yeah," Patrick says breathlessly, pushing Jonny back so he can sit up, straddling Patrick's thighs. "Yeah, do it, Jonny – "

Jonny's pants are already open – he must have undid them sometime while he was blowing Patrick, and damn if that doesn't get Patrick hot again, the thought of Jonny getting off so much on sucking Patrick off that it was too painful for his cock to be caged in his pants, that he was maybe touching himself while doing it. As Patrick watches, Jonny shoves his pants and briefs down just enough to get his cock out, and then he's closing his fist around it and jerking it in short, hard strokes, his breath puffing out harshly on every exhale.

Patrick's seen Jonny naked before, of course, hundreds of times before and after games in the showers and the locker room, but somehow the sight of Jonny sitting fully clothed on his thighs, nothing uncovered except the blood-red head of his cock from the tight circle of his fist, it makes Jonny look more exposed to him than he's ever been.

There's a pearly bead of precome at the head of Jonny's cock, and Jonny actually snaps rigid when Patrick reaches out to rub his thumb over it, smearing it into the skin, and then he's coming, the first spurt landing across Patrick's knuckles, searing hot. Patrick folds his hand over Jonny's and works him through it, catching as much of Jonny's come in his palm as he can, watching it drip between his fingers while Jonny silently shakes above him and then slumps forward, breathing hard into Patrick's cheek.

The heat of Jonny's come is shocking, hotter even than Jonny's usual temperature, and Patrick likes it. He likes it a lot.

He manages to work his hand out from between their bodies where Jonny's still lying on him to catch his breath, and licks the come from his fingers. It's still hot when he does it, and he relishes the heat of it on his tongue. Jonny shudders, and Patrick realizes he's watching, looking at Patrick eat his come off his hand.

"I need to clean us up," Jonny finally mumbles, but he doesn’t seem at all inclined to get off Patrick's body, and Patrick doesn't really want him to either, even though he's a suffocatingly heavy weight on him.

"Later," Patrick says.

"Okay," Jonny agrees, surprisingly, and rolls onto his side with a groan so he can tuck Pat up against him, wrapping him up with arms and legs. It takes about five seconds for both of them to fall asleep, clothes on and come-sticky and everything.

When they wake up the next morning, neither of them mentions it, and Patrick wonders if it means anything at all.

___

 

Jonny doesn’t speak to him about it in the ensuing days, but neither does he treat Patrick any differently. He still yells at Patrick during practice and games, hollering at him to _fucking pass, you fucking show off_ , he still wraps Patrick up in those full body hugs whenever he scores a goal, and they still fall asleep in the same bed on the road, even though Jonny doesn’t so much as kiss him again.

So Patrick writes it off as a one-off, a pity fuck, maybe, and it's actually sad how he's _not_ sad over the fact that they had sex because Jonny took pity on his drunkenness, or wanted to comfort him after that shit game against the Habs and the whole mess with Bouillon. He's not sad because, well, he'd already learned, long ago, to take what he can get from this unrequited love business. It was hands down the best sex of Patrick's life, and he's _still_ best friends with Jonny, and Jonny isn't doing anything different, so yeah. He'll file it away as spank bank material for the rest of his life, and move on.

Except that it happens again, and Patrick should have known it.

____

 

They're on the road again, playing the Bruins in Boston; it's another terrible, terrible game, and they lose it too, which means they're on the fourth of a four game losing streak. Fucking Patrice Bergeron shapeshifted his maximum of three times whenever there was enough traffic in front of Bulin to be confusing, turning alternately into Duncs or Seabs and fooling various Hawks players into giving him the puck, which he'd flicked easily into the net behind Bulin for his hat trick – it wasn’t like Bulin was going to be suspicious of someone he thought was Duncs hanging about too near the crease. Laddy had pulled one back for them, but it was too little, too late.

Patrick hadn’t used his ability a single time, and he wonders, when they're back in the hotel, the team silent and dispirited, why he doesn’t just pull it out in each and every game. It doesn’t really matter whether he does or not – the media will still have crap to say about him, so why doesn’t he just let it roll off his back and use it to help his team win games? If he's going to have a – what do they call it, _unique advantage_ (like super speed is anything advantageous in hockey when you have shit like Brodeur's ability to grow eight extra arms or Eric Staal being able to create actual mini _hurricanes_ that can steer pucks away from opposing sticks and into opposing nets; Patrick thinks he might never stop laughing if he spends more than a single second ruminating on that little quirk of fate), why doesn’t he ever feel like fucking using it, even to help his team?

Jonny bundles him into bed after he's stripped down to his boxer briefs, Patrick still in a soft t-shirt, because he's not a fucking exhibitionist like Jonny. He feels the bed dip as Jonny settles behind him, and there's the familiar weight of him pressing into his back as he tugs Pat into his chest and wraps an arm around him, breath puffing hotly against the nape of Patrick's neck and making his curls flutter. His hand is splayed out on Patrick's belly, warm over his shirt. It's soothing and quiet and so, so comforting.

"I'm sorry," Patrick blurts out. His voice sounds unnaturally loud to him, in the silence of the room.

"For?" Jonny mumbles behind him. His lips are close enough to Patrick's neck that Patrick can feel the movements ghosting over his skin. He can't help but shiver a little, thighs twisting together.

"For tonight. I – I should have done better. I'm sorry."

There's a shift of movement behind him, then suddenly Patrick's rolled onto his back, Jonny leaning over him. He's got his captain face on, the one that Patrick knows means he's gearing up for a pep talk, the way he does in the locker room to shake the team out of a funk after a disappointing loss, but Patrick – doesn’t want that. He doesn’t want Alternate Captain Jonny. He wants _Jonny_ Jonny now, and he doesn’t know how to tell him that, except to lean up and kiss him.

It's a soft, slow kiss, not at all urgent or sloppy like their first kiss was over two months ago, but it's exactly what Patrick needs right now. Just the feel of Jonny's lips on his, burning hot like he remembers, Jonny's hand curving over his stomach and rucking up his tshirt to rub circles into the skin.

Patrick could probably have just stayed here and kissed Jonny like this for hours, except that Jonny's hand slides a little lower on his stomach and his little finger snags on the waistband of his boxers, slides in, and then Jonny freezes.

He lifts his head and pulls his hand away, looking mortified, and Patrick misses his hand and his mouth immediately.

"I didn’t – mean to," Jonny begins, and Patrick just licks his lips, looks up at him from under his lashes.

"Do you want to?" he asks.

Jonny doesn’t reply, though Patrick can see a muscle working in his jaw. The hand he'd removed from Patrick's body is dangling between them, and as Patrick watches, it clenches and unfurls, like Jonny can't help his body's instinctive reactions.

"Because you can, you know, if you want to," Patrick continues, and then plunges on in, his need making him bold. "You can, any time you want."

Jonny stares at him for a few seconds, as if letting his words sink in, and then leans in to kiss him again, this time harder, hungrier, and Patrick's dick is getting with the program and starting to fill.

He gropes for Jonny's hand and when he finds it, drags it back to his stomach, slides it down over his abs, down _down_ until he's cupping Patrick through his boxers. Patrick cants his hips up a bit, just to let Jonny know that hey, here he is, he's ready for more, and Jonny, thank God, gets the point, squeezes his cock once, and then pulls his boxers down so he can get his hand properly around Patrick's dick.

Patrick gasps a little at that, the searing touch of Jonny's clever hand on his cock. He's always had a thing for Jonny's hands, the fingers so long and thick, the magic in them that lets him play hockey the way he does. Jonny jerks him off, sure but gentle, never letting up on kissing him until Patrick's sure that his lips are going to be fucking cooked through by Jonny's heat.

Jonny finally moves away from his mouth to nose at his neck and suck at his collarbone, his hand speeding up on Patrick's cock. It takes an embarrassingly short amount of time, a bright stinging hickey on his collarbone, and a clever twist of Jonny's wrist, his thumb pressing at the slit in the head of Patrick's cock, before Patrick's coming, moaning shamelessly into Jonny's mouth and his hips jerking uncontrollably into Jonny's fist.

"Yeah, that's it," Jonny says, pulling away, looking pleased and satisfied. "That's good, Pat. You did so good."

And that - _that_ is exactly what Patrick needs to hear, right now. That he's good, that he's done well. At something, anything, so he can forget just how much he's not doing well at hockey.

He grins up at Jonny, the despair clouding him earlier slowly lifting, and reaches down to palm Jonny, who is predictably hard as a rock.

"I'm going to suck you now, Jonny," he announces, and slithers down Jonny's body and gets his boxers off, and then he's going to fucking town until Jonny is writhing under him.

Jonny's cock is perfect, just like the rest of him, and Patrick can't get enough of the feel of it in his mouth, heavy on his tongue, and burning hot, just barely edging against Patrick's pain threshold. He tongues it sloppily, flicking his eyes up at Jonny every few seconds, and yeah – Jonny's watching him, mouth open and eyes dark and crazy with lust, so Pat puts on a bit of a show, holding Jonny's cock at the base and slurping his tongue sloppily up and down it, from his fist to the tip. Then he sucks it down again, deep enough that it's pressing right up against the back of his throat, and swallows, his cheeks hollowing.

Jonny nearly flies off the bed, eyes rolling back, and Patrick mentally thanks the fuck buddy he'd had in Ontario the year before who'd taught him how to deepthroat and control his gag reflex.

He keeps at it, alternately sucking and swallowing, working his throat around Jonny's cock, and Jonny's leaking so much precome into his mouth that all he can taste is the salty musk of it, can't even differentiate it from his saliva anymore. He reaches up with a hand to stroke Jonny's balls, just gently rolling them, before he slips a finger down and strokes it over Jonny's hole, the tip pressing in slightly even though it's dry, like Jonny's hole is practically opening up for Pat's finger.

Jonny comes with a shout, suddenly and completely unexpected, coming in his throat in long spurts, and his cock and his come are so hot in Patrick's mouth. Patrick loves it, nothing but Jonny's heat in him and his cock pulsing in his mouth, and there's so much Patrick can't even swallow it all in time. When he lifts his head from Jonny's cock, he's gasping, eyes watering, and there's come leaking down his chin, all over his lips, fucking everywhere. It's messy and filthy and officially replaces their last time as the best sex Patrick's ever had.

Jonny somehow gets them cleaned up and wraps himself around Patrick like an octopus again, peppering kisses across his shoulders and neck. It's soothing and it's slowly lulling Pat into sleep, when suddenly Jonny says, "Don't apologise."

It takes Patrick's tired, sex-dumb mind a while to connect what Jonny just said with the apology he'd blurted out way earlier, and he wants to answer, but he's asleep before he can say anything.

The next morning, they wake up late, and in the chaos of fighting for the bathroom and packing haphazardly and tripping over each other's bags while rushing to make their flight back to Chicago, they don't bring last night up at all.

___

 

But then – they start making out a lot more regularly after that. It's like Patrick telling Jonny he can touch, _any time he wants_ , has opened the sex floodgates in Jonny's brain. They keep it mostly to the road though, because it's not like they can fool around in Bowman's basement where Patrick's staying, or in Jonny's bedroom in Seabs' home. Well, they probably could, Patrick thinks, but Jonny says it's just weird, making out in a house that's not your own, when you're living under someone else's roof. And Jonny is paranoid as hell about Seabs walking into his room and catching them at it, because he's a stupidly polite Canadian, Mr. Alternate Captain, with scruples and morals, so.

"Seabs probably knows anyway," Patrick says drowsily one night when he's staying over at Seabs' place with Jonny and managed to convince Jonny into quick handjobs, after which Jonny spent like half an hour fretting about whether Patrick was too loud and whether Seabs heard them. Which, okay, is a legitimate concern; Patrick generally can't keep silent during sex, but Seabs's house is enormous and Jonny's bedroom is at the end of the house furthest from Seabs' bedroom.

"How would he even know?" Jonny shoots back.

Patrick arches an eyebrow at him. "Dude, I stay over here more than I stay at Stan's, do you even realize? And your room only has a double bed."

Jonny is turning alarmingly red and his eyes are getting kind of wild again. It's amazing how easily riled up he can get.

"Okay, dude, like, is this going to be a problem?" Patrick says, pulling himself into a sitting position. "Because if it is, I'm just gonna go. Jesus, it was just a fucking handie, nothing we haven’t done before."

"Wait," Jonny says, pushing him back with a hand on his chest. "No – don't go. Christ." He runs his hand through his hair, looking frustrated, and he still looks so unreasonably attractive that Patrick just wants to kiss him senseless.

"Then what is wrong? Are you afraid of what people might think? Seabs is a good guy, he wouldn’t give a shit. And – " Patrick laughs a little – "it's not like I don’t know what it feels like anyway, being shit on and gossiped about."

"What are you talking about now?"

Patrick hesitates, biting his lip. He hadn’t meant to say that; the words had just slipped out of him.

"Pat. Spit it out."

"Nothing much," Patrick says, shrugging, looking down. "Just. You know. All the stuff they say about my super fucking speed."

"Jesus, Pat. That's got nothing to do with – with our teammates finding out we're fucking."

"Why not?" Patrick retorts. "Because it'll screw up locker room dynamics? Because it'll mess with our game? Well, what do you think all the shit people are saying is doing to my game now?"

Jonny is staring at him like he can't believe where their conversation's just turned. "Patrick, you can't – "

And suddenly Patrick feels so fucking _tired_ , and he doesn’t want to listen to Jonny's whole captain schtick anymore. "I'm done here, man. Do you want me to stay, or leave?"

It takes a while, but finally Jonny sighs. "Stay," he tells Patrick, and Patrick gratefully burrows back into his arms.

"Listen," Jonny says quietly, "I didn’t mean that shit, about Seabs. I know he wouldn’t care if he knew about us. I – I'm really not concerned about the guys finding out."

"Okay. You shouldn’t be anyway. We're just like, what, fuck buddies, aren’t we? I mean, still best friends, but best friends who fuck a lot."

Patrick spits that out without thinking, again, but the minute he says that he realizes he's articulated something that's always been in the back of his mind. It's been picking at him like a bug in his ear, bothering him almost as much as whatever the media likes to throw at him for his play. He's able to deal with them and shut them out as long as he's got Jonny playing on his line and encouraging him. He's not so able to forget about how this _thing_ he's got going on with Jonny doesn’t leave the bedroom.

Jonny's arms tighten around him, so minutely that if Patrick hadn’t been holding his breath for Jonny's reaction, he wouldn’t have felt it. "Is that what we are now?" he asks, and his voice is so soft Patrick has to strain to hear it.

"Yeah. Isn't it?" Patrick replies. He's not going to fucking guilt Jonny into loving him back, or whatever. Patrick likes to think he's a better man than that.

Then – "Okay. Yeah. Whatever," Jonny says, and Patrick feels a flash of irritation, like he'd expected Jonny to – to do what? To put up more of a resistance? To give Patrick a bouquet of roses and declare his undying love?

"We're still gonna have to talk about that other thing, soon," Jonny says, and Patrick knows he's not going to give up until he's actually tried to fix it, because he thinks that's what captains and alternate captains need to do. Even with their fuck buddies.

Patrick shrugs as best as he can while lying down in the circle of Jonny's arms. He falls asleep faster than he thought he would, and the last thought in his mind before he does is whether fuck buddies actually cuddle and spend the night, the way they do.

___

 

There are nights when they don't have sex, when either he or Jonny just wants to sleep, and they sleep together the same, cuddling and limbs so tangled together Patrick can't even get up to take a piss without waking Jonny. It's times like those that make Patrick wonder more whether real fuck buddies do shit like this.

On one of those nights, they're chatting about the game they watched on NBC earlier, Ducks against Coyotes, talking about the last minute of the third period when Craig Weller had conjured a stream of water at the point, and it had taken the puck right to the back of the Ducks' net and left the Ducks' goalie sopping wet and furious. Patrick had laughed at how cleverly it was done, the sight of Weller whooping after his game winning goal making him feel a twinge of longing, wishing that he could use his ability that freely, wishing he could be so happy after scoring a goal using it.

"Hey," he says to Jonny, interrupting his droning about plays. "Do you – how do you feel after you use your ability?"

"Why?" Jonny asks, warily.

"I just want to know. Just curious, I guess."

"It's – well. It's hard to explain. It feels good, obviously, especially if I score a goal. Feels like I'm letting something that's all tied up in knots inside me go and be free, or something."

And yeah, Patrick can relate to that. He always feels like he's tied up in knots inside, his power always pulsing in him, begging to be unleashed. He keeps it caged deep inside him.

"Don't you feel like that too?" Jonny asks.

"I don't know," Patrick says, and his voice cracks a bit. He clears his throat. "I don't think I've ever felt that way since I was, I don't know, nine years old, maybe."

Then he's telling Jonny everything, halting at first, but all the words and thoughts he's kept pent up inside just pouring out of him, like he can't stop even if someone tapes his mouth closed. About how his ability manifested when he was seven, and for the first couple of years everyone said he was destined for great things, that he was special, a prodigy, and his ability would be so much more powerful than other people's, because it was so strong that it manifested so soon. And then, when they found out he had an interest and talent in hockey, at first it was okay, it was great, everyone saying a unique power like his would be perfect for a sport like hockey. That was until he started playing in junior leagues, and started winning all the time, and making the other youngsters around him look stupid, that the whispers of _cheat_ and _unfair advantage_ and all the rest of it started, finally growing into a loud crescendo when he was drafted into the NHL.

And then – and then Patrick's never again felt that same ecstatic joy he'd felt when he was seven years old and just learning how to harness and control his power. It's all he can do to keep from using it, and he can't _not_ use it, and it just sucks, all round.

Jonny's quiet when he finishes, his hot hand stroking Patrick's bicep, rubbing up and down slowly.

"I've never told anyone this," Patrick admits.

"My ability manifested when I was seven too. At Christmas as well," Jonny says slowly. Patrick's eyes grow wide and he punches Jonny in the ribs, gently.

"You never told me!"

"Why would I? You never asked."

"It's rude to ask. My mom brought me up right, dickhead."

"It's rude to ask most people, not when it's your best friend, asshole."

"Fine, so tell me now, I want to know."

"There's not much to tell," Jonny says, thoughtful. "It didn’t appear so dramatically like yours did. I remember, we were in the living room after dinner, and it was snowing like hell, and my dad was trying to get the fire going in our fireplace. And for some reason, he couldn’t get it to start, no matter what he did, the logs were kind of damp. And I just – I don’t know, I just felt like, this heat, burning up in me, like it started at my feet and started rising all the way up to my brain. I didn’t know what was going on, but something in me told me to reach out and touch the logs, and I did. And they burst right into flames."

Patrick listens, enraptured. Jonny doesn’t look or sound ashamed, or embarrassed, or anything. In fact, he looks pleased, as if this is a nice memory for him. It probably is.

"My dad nearly passed out from surprise. He says he grabbed me to pull me away from the fire, and I was so hot all over, like how I am now. My temperature had always been normal before then, but since that day it's just been like this."

"That sounds amazing," Patrick says wistfully. "I wish I had an ability like yours."

"Shut up," Jonny says. "You know how good yours is. You need to learn how to ignore all the morons."

"I'll ignore your face," Patrick retorts, most intelligent comeback ever, and then Jonny shoves him a bit and he's shoving back, and the whole thing devolves into a tickling match that Patrick loses, of course, fuck Jonny for not being ticklish.

___

 

The night they win in a tight 3-2 match against the Pens in Pittsburgh is the first time Jonny fingers Patrick.

Patrick got a goal, and he should have been happy. He _was_ happy, until he'd come across the first article from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and it was lavishing praise on the Crosby-Malkin pairing and their telepathic abilities. It's so fucking unfair that two telepaths get drafted by the same team. It's even more fucking unfair that people praise them for it, even when they lose the game.

He needs more, that night, and when Jonny's leisurely sucking him off, the pad of his index finger rubbing over the tight clench of Patrick's hole, Patrick pushes back into it and gasps, "You can, Jonny", and Jonny pulls off his cock, mouth open and red, staring back at Patrick like Patrick's just given him an early birthday gift and he can't quite believe it.

"You can," Patrick repeats. "It's not – I've done it to myself before, okay? Just do it."

"Fuck," Jonny hisses, as if the idea of Patrick touching himself that way when he's getting off alone, fucking himself open on his fingers, is the single hottest thing Jonny's ever heard. Patrick thinks of how he might react if Jonny tells him he does that, fingers himself on his own beautifully long fingers, and his cock twitches. Okay, yeah, so it can be a pretty fucking hot mental image.

They don't have lube, so Jonny appropriates the small bottle of body lotion the hotel provides in the bathroom. It smells all sorts of sickly and artificial, but when Jonny's got one finger slicked up and pressing into him, Patrick doesn’t give a damn if it smells like honeysuckle and rainbows or sulphurous hellfires.

"Christ," Jonny says, his voice so deep and rough, like _he's_ the one getting fingered. "Pat – I don’t know, you feel so good, is this good?"

Patrick nods frantically. He doesn’t feel much with just a finger, except for the incendiary heat of Jonny's body temperature, but just knowing that it's Jonny doing this to him, kneeling between his legs so he can watch himself pump his finger slowly in and out of Patrick, is getting his cock leaking so much it's smearing a shiny patch of precome onto his belly. "It's great, it's fucking good," he babbles, tilting his hips upwards. "One more, Jonny, come the fuck on – "

Jonny gives it to him, sliding it in slow and sure, and finally there's that slight burn and stretch that makes Patrick twist his hips into it. Patrick has no idea if Jonny's fingered guys before, or even if he's fingered girls, but he's doing a damn good job at it, fingers stroking inside him, pressing into all the soft yielding parts of Patrick's body. Then he completely stops thinking, because Jonny inclines his fingers just so, and pushes right into Pat's prostate. Patrick shouts, body clenching, vision whiting out for a split second before he gropes blindly between his legs and catches hold of Jonny's wrist, grabbing it tight.

Jonny is worrying at his lip again. "Okay? Too much?" he asks, and Patrick shakes his head, grinding himself down on Jonny's hand while holding it in place, getting Jonny's fingers in just the right angle to rub against that spot each time.

"No, fuck, it's just – Jonny, s'fucking great," he says, slurring with how good it is, fucking himself shamelessly on Jonny's hand, and when he finally manages to look up at Jonny's face, it's completely flushed, his eyes fixed on where his fingers are disappearing inside Patrick. He reaches over with his other hand, rubbing at the rim of Patrick's hole before hooking a finger inside and tugging it open a little more so he can slide a third finger right in. Patrick jerks and whines, so fucking over-sensitised everywhere, feeling like his entire body is lighting up, sparking with electricity.

"You feel so good, Pat," Jonny says, breathless, never taking his eyes off the way Patrick's taking his fingers in. "You just – " he changes the angle a little, pressing into his prostate more forcefully now, and Patrick's cock practically jumps and drools a trickle of precome that drips down the side of his cock, and Jonny leans over quickly to lick it away. "You feel so tight, fuck," he says against Pat's cock, and Patrick is about half a second away from losing it. "I want – one day, I'm gonna get my cock in there, Patrick. Want to feel you so tight around me like you are now, make you come just from getting fucked on my cock – "

And then Patrick really loses it, coming with a yell, spurting come onto Jonny's face while Jonny continues to kiss and suck at his cock and fingerfuck him ruthlessly through it.

"Okay, god," Patrick says a while later when he's got his breath back, rolling over onto his front and pressing Jonny into the sheets. "I've got you." He gets his hand around Jonny's cock, stroking him, leaning in to mouth at the sharp cut of muscle at his hip.

"I wasn’t complaining anyway," Jonny complains, but he cants his hips up, fucking into Patrick's tight fist. Patrick loves how worked up Jonny can get just from doing things to get Pat off. It never takes long for Jonny to come if he's been concentrating on making Patrick come first.

"You gonna come soon?" he asks, although he doesn’t need to. It's pretty obvious Jonny's close, his face red, fists clenched in the sheets and his body trembling with need. He closes his mouth around the head of Jonny's cock, sucks at it and gets it nice and wet, pulling off again to jerk him off faster. "I wanna watch you come, Jonny."

Jonny arches a little, his abs standing out in stark relief. "Yeah, yeah, I'm almost there, keep going," he says, his voice husky.

"Not gonna stop, Jonny," Patrick says, punctuating his words with a wet sucking kiss on Jonny's cock, the way Jonny had done it earlier while Patrick was coming. "I want you to come on me. Get me dirty for you."

"Shit," Jonny groans. "Shit, fuck, your filthy fucking mouth, Patrick – " and he's coming, burning hot as usual, striping across Patrick's lips, cheek, chin. His eyes are wide open as he shakes through it, watching himself come on Patrick's face, watching Patrick just take it, tongue sliding out to lick whatever he can reach. It's something Patrick's jerked off to countless times before, even when they hadn’t started doing this, imagining what it would be like to have Jonny come on his face, mark Patrick as _his_.

It's about ten million times hotter and better in real life than it ever was in Patrick's fantasies.

They both sort of clean up as best as they can, not an easy task when neither of them can stand steadily. Patrick's finally drifting to sleep, curled up against Jonny's broad chest, but his eyes snap open when Jonny says from behind him, voice sex-rough and soft from sleep, "You don't have to feel bad. About anything. You don't have to give a shit about people who need to write things the masses like to believe."

Patrick says nothing. He's feeling good still, loose-limbed from his orgasm, and he would really prefer not to do this now, but Jonny apparently has other ideas.

"Told you before. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. This thing is yours, it's up to you if you want to use it, or not use it, whatever. I don’t care."

"Even if we're losing?" Patrick asks quietly.

"Even if," replies Jonny. "I wouldn’t make anyone on my team do something they didn’t want to, that's causing them grief."

Patrick laughs a little, and he hates how bitter he sounds, his post-orgasm feelings rapidly ebbing away. "Are you kidding me? You're the alternate captain. Your job is to get us to win, not – not to coddle me or anyone else, or tell us we don’t have to pull out all the stops and do whatever we can to fucking win."

Jonny's arms tighten around him for a moment. "Shit, Kaner." And there it is – he's reverted back to calling Patrick _Kaner_ – "You don't need to, you know what I mean? You're good enough to win it for us, whether you use your ability or not. I don’t need to tell you to fucking use it, because you're so good you can pull off a win for us even if you don’t bother to. That's how good you are."

"Hah," Patrick says weakly. "I'm not – Jonny, I said you don’t have to fucking coddle me."

"I'm not. Christ, you're a stubborn fuck. I'm telling you the truth. Why can't you just accept it?"

"You want to know why?" Patrick says, pulling away from Jonny and sitting up. Jonny's turned off all the lights in the room, so he can't see him, and if he can't see Jonny that means Jonny can't see his face either, so he allows himself to – let everything that's been bubbling inside him the past year to just come out of him, in a torrent. "How do you think I feel, knowing that whatever I do will never be good enough? If I use my fucking ability, people say I cheat, that I'm so small I wouldn’t ever have made it into the NHL if I didn't have super speed and agility, that I must be deploying it all the fucking time on the ice, which is why I'm slightly faster than the average 6'5 player. If I don't use it, I'm selfish, I don’t care about the team. And then I see people like fucking Sidney Crosby and Jagr and even _you_ , getting praised for your special abilities, for your natural skills, all the fucking time, and I'm just – I'm sick of it, Jonny. Sometimes I think, maybe it's better if I just quit, if I fucked off back to Buffalo and never touched a stick again in my life, because _I can't fucking win whatever I do_ \- "

Jonny's up and at his side in an instant, gathering Patrick into his arms and pressing his face into his chest, fingers carding through his curls. "Hey, hey, Pat," he says, and he sounds so alarmed, like he thinks Patrick's crying or going to cry, and no – Patrick's not going to, because he's shed enough tears since he was seven years old over his unique fucking power. "Don't – god, okay, it's hard for you, I know it is, do you think I never read the damn papers?"

"If you know, then don't fucking act like it's just something I can get over and brush off, you don't even know, okay, you have no idea what it feels like – "

"You're right, I don't know what it's like to be attacked like that, and you've just – you've put up with it so fucking well, I don't know how you do it, but – Patrick, come on, you must know how good you are, since we were kids I always knew you'd be great one day."

Patrick swallows. "I know I'm good," he says. "But no one else seems to know it."

Jonny clutches him tighter. "I know it, and the guys know it. Fuck, the entire league knows it – why the hell do you think everyone gets so pissed when you do deploy your ability? It’s because you're already so fucking good, naturally, that you're already hard to stop; when you use it, you're practically unstoppable."

"I've been stopped, easily," Patrick points out. "Remember Liles? I kept crashing into him whenever he turned into that giant goddamned brick wall."

Jonny snorts. "Please, can you tell me honestly and truthfully now that for this past year, each time you've used your ability, you've put your whole heart into it and really unleashed your full power?"

And that – that shuts Patrick right up. Because Jonny's right, he's never really put his whole heart into it; there's always the fear holding him back, the awful certainty that whether he scored or not while using his ability, there would still be the articles after the game finding various ways to castigate him for it. And then he thinks of that time with Bouillon, when he'd been so angry, and that was – yeah, that was the first and only time all season he'd gone right in, grasped the very core of his power and pulled it all out, and he had scored, done it so fast that no one on the Habs had been able to pull off any counter-defenses.

The wonder of it all is that Jonny's been able to see through him all this while and know that he wasn’t putting his full effort into it. And if Jonny's right about that, then maybe, just maybe, he's right about other teams being scared shitless of Patrick. Patrick thinks about their match against the Pens, how Fleury's lips had thinned each time he saw him hovering near the net, how Letang had practically marked him the entire game to the exclusion of other players and been oddly tense whenever Patrick hesitated on the ice, like he was preparing for Patrick to deploy his ability. Patrick had chalked all these reactions, so common in all the games he's played, to other teams hating him for his ability, for cheating.

But Jonny said it was because they _feared_ him. Because they knew how good he was and what he could do.

Jesus, Patrick thinks. So many months wasted, thinking he wasn’t good enough, worrying over what a bunch of journalists might say, and he wasn’t even performing at his highest level.

Jonny's silent, and Patrick realizes he's been holding him all this while, fingers combing through the tangled curls of his hair, letting his fingers catch on them.

"Maybe you're right," he admits, and Jonny laughs lowly.

"I'm always right," he says, and Patrick rolls his eyes.

"Yeah. So I suppose you're right about how awesome I am. And how much more superior I am to you, you fucking firestarter."

"How dare you," Jonny says dryly. "Fire is hot stuff. Like me. I'm hot stuff."

There's a laugh bubbling out of Patrick's throat that he can't tamp down. "And I guess that means you like my hands? Does it like, turn you on when I'm being all smooth with the puck?"

Jonny's arms tighten around him. "Maybe you should sleep."

"Maybe I should remind you how good my hands are and how much you like them."

"Patrick," Jonny says, and Pat can _feel_ him shudder, just a little.

Thank fuck for the almost-nonexistent refractory periods of nineteen year olds.

___

 

"First things first," Jonny declares when they're home, back in Seabs' house, after they've thrashed the Sabres 4-0 (Patrick scored two, one normally, and one with his ability, and he's frankly amazed at how incredibly easy it was when he finally let himself go and made use of his ability to its fullest, no fear or hesitation to hold it in check). "You are not going to look at any news sites, or articles, or anything like that. You're not going to search that shit out like you used to. You and I are going to stay here and play Call of Duty for the next two days, until we have our next game."

"And fuck a lot," Patrick adds.

"Okay. We play Call of Duty and fuck a lot until our next game," Jonny agrees, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

Patrick listens to Jonny and does not look at anything, and when he heads into the next game, it's amazing how much lighter he feels, how much better he can play, when he doesn’t have that crap weighing on his mind.

They win, of course. And then they just keep on winning.

___

 

Despite their late surge, they don't make the playoffs. They miss it by just three points, three fucking points, but it's still the closest Chicago has come to the playoffs in years.

But the best bit – Patrick wins the Calder.

He is stunned, beyond shocked, when his name is called from the podium. He glances up at the big screen when he's walking towards the stage, and he looks absolutely calm on it, his face barely even smiling, even though inside he's practically shaking to pieces. Jonny gets up when he passes his seat, and they shake hands and hug briefly; Jonny's body is hot and familiar beneath the tuxedo that makes Patrick want to get to his knees and blow him right there.

He'd expected it to be Jonny; yeah, he was the highest-scoring rookie, but that doesn’t necessarily translate into a Calder win. Jonny's the golden boy, he's the one all the fans and papers fawn over, alternate captain, has a power that is breathtaking and effective and doesn’t incite calls of unfairness or cheating. He'd thought it would be Jonny for sure, even though he'd prepared a speech because his mom had bugged him to, "just in case".

Well, the "just in case" has turned into a real thing, and when Patrick's saying his speech on stage, he catches Jonny's eye, and the look on Jonny's face is just – so unbelievably proud that it makes Patrick's heart ache and heat up, all at the same time.

___

 

Patrick goes out with his family for drinks after the awards ceremony, hyped up and high on success, and he is way too keyed up to sleep when they all finally return to their hotel. He's glad he got separate rooms for each of his sisters and himself, and that Jonny and his family are staying in the same hotel, because then after he's showered and ready he can text Jonny: _hey, come over?_

Jonny appears at his door five minutes later, and the door's barely shut behind him before he's grabbing Patrick and lifting him into a kiss. Patrick's spine immediately melts into jelly, the way it does whenever Jonny gets his hands on him.

"God, I told you so," Jonny says when he pulls away, and he looks so triumphant that Patrick has to laugh.

"I thought you hate losing."

"Yeah," Jonny agrees. "But not enough to keep me from the satisfaction of telling you, _I told you so_."

Patrick punches him lightly in the arm. "Asshole," he complains, and then grins. Jonny grins back down at him – Patrick knows exactly what his dimples do to Jonny, and in fact Jonny's rubbing a thumb over the dimple in his right cheek now, looking at him in that fond way that always makes Patrick wonder if he actually does think of this whole arrangement as anything more than just two good friends helping to get each other's rocks off.

"You were right," he tells Jonny, voice soft. "I wasn’t trying early in the season because I cared too much about what people were thinking about me. Once I stopped caring and started trying, I got this. The fucking Calder, Jonny. And it should have been you."

"Stop," Jonny says right away, clapping his hand over his mouth. Patrick licks it, just to be gross, and Jonny snatches it back, glaring. "Don’t be disgusting, Pat."

"You've had my spit on more than just your hand," Patrick says, blinking up at him innocently, milking his big eyes for all they're worth, and that does it – Jonny's crowding him towards the bed, pushing him into it, crawling on top of him to kiss him wildly.

"God, stop trying to distract me with your fucking mouth," Jonny groans after they've kissed for a while, clothes already off, rutting lazily against each other. "I wasn’t finished, man."

"Okay, shut up and talk to me after you've finished me," Patrick says breathlessly. "I want you to fuck me, Jonny."

Jonny rears back like Pat's punched him in the chest. "Jesus. Don't joke about things like that, you dick."

"I'm not joking," Patrick insists, and then to show him just how serious he is, he spreads his legs and guides Jonny's hand down between them to where he's already slick and loose, open from his fingers when he was showering earlier. He's very proud of himself for having the foresight to pack lube and everything to Montreal. He's wet enough that Jonny's finger slides in easily to the second knuckle when Patrick presses it to his hole, and Jonny makes this incredibly hot, strangled moaning sound that Patrick's never heard from him.

"Yep," Pat says, grinning. "Got myself ready for you and everything. So you can fuck the Calder winner, right here." He opens his legs wider, shameless, and clenches around Jonny's finger. Jonny makes that noise again.

"Okay, fuck, you're going to kill me one day, you asshole," he says, pulling his finger out, eyes looking all frantic and crazy. "Where's the – stuff – "

Patrick snags the bottle of lube from under the pillow and tosses it at him. "Hurry the fuck up."

"But – condoms?" Jonny asks, and Patrick kind of wants to kiss him and kill him for being so fucking _sensible_ at a time like this when all he wants is to finally get Jonny's cock inside him.

"Dude, we both get tested all the time by the team doctors. I'm clean, you are too, aren’t you? Unless you're fucking someone else."

Jonny shakes his head. "God, Pat, you should know – who the hell else would I fuck apart from you?"

Patrick's heart does a little leap in his throat. He'd known that, of course; Jonny's either with the team or with him all the time, they're practically living in each other's pockets, but it's something different to hear Jonny _say_ it out loud, that he's only doing this with Patrick and no one else. _Hah! Just fuck buddies, my ass,_ Patrick thinks, a little deliriously, and says out loud, "I'm not doing anyone else either. It's just you, man, always has been. Now can you just get in me already? I've been wanting your cock for fucking months, I don’t even know."

"Oh, Pat, fuck," Jonny groans, but he's snapping open the bottle with shaky hands, lubing his cock up, and isn’t that something new, Jonathan Toews with his hands shaking like they never do on the ice. "Why do you do this to me?" And he hitches one of Pat's legs over his shoulder, turning to kiss at the delicate jut of his ankle bone, grips Patrick's hips with his big hands and lifts like Pat weighs nothing – and just pushes right in.

Patrick feels like all the air's been forced out of his lungs, his insides all shifting to accommodate Jonny's girth in him. He's been fingered by Jonny more times than he can count by now, he can take four of Jonny's lovely, perfect fingers, but this – this fills him up in an entirely different way, making him feel so utterly full that his body doesn’t even have space for the air he breathes in; and yet it doesn’t hurt, his body taking Jonny's cock like he was made for it, like Jonny was made to fit in him like this. And Jonny's cock is just so fucking hot, burning inside him, the heat radiating all the way to his fingers and toes. His nerves are fucking tingling from it.

"Jonny," he moans, when Jonny's bottomed out. His hand flutters low on his stomach and presses, thinking somewhat hazily that Jonny's so far in, he can feel his cock right there. "Fuck me, _please_ , I need you to fuck me – "

"I am, I am," Jonny says, nonsensically, because he's _not even moving_ , but then he does; Patrick takes a great gasp of air when Jonny draws back, and then it's punched right out of him again when Jonny snaps his hips and pounds back in.

"Is that all you got?" Patrick asks, when he's gulped in enough air to speak. "You're fucking the Calder winner here. Put some heart into it."

"I'll give you heart," Jonny snarls, and yeah, Patrick's always known how to get him going – just appeal to his competitive streak, imply he's not doing great, Jonny is so easy. And then he's just floating off, entire body high on pleasure, when Jonny begins to fuck him hard, really hard, until Pat knows he's going to feel it all the way in his bones tomorrow.

"I want to fucking feel it," he grits out between his teeth, straining up to meet Jonny's thrusts, slamming the breath out of him. "Come on, Jonny, I wanna be feeling your cock in me the whole damn week whenever I _move_ \- "

Jonny makes a low, broken noise, and fucks Patrick harder until he's pushed all the way up to the headboard and he has to bear his hands against it so his head won't be pounded into it, and yes – yeah, he'll feel it all right, Jonny giving it to him the way he wants it, fucking into Patrick like a champ, and of course Jonny would be a champ at anything he sets his hand (or mouth, or cock) to, Patrick's never had any doubt of that. He writhes helplessly on Jonny's cock, needing more of it, moaning encouragement at him and telling him how good his cock feels, how much he loves this, and Jonny groans and drops his head so he can suck wetly at Patrick's neck and shoulders while he fucks Patrick cross-eyed.

In the end, Jonny comes first, and Patrick takes it, tells him frantically, "Yeah, come in me, Jonny, get me wet – " and fucks himself back on him, clenching as tight as he can. Jonny's entire body strains when he comes, muscles all standing out starkly, and Patrick always likes to look at him when he's coming, because the sight of Jonny's body above him, biceps bulging and abs straining and his spectacular thighs bunching up, is always great to behold. He can feel Jonny coming inside him, so wet, and burning hot, and it's possibly the best thing Patrick's ever felt, Jonny's spunk inside him, getting him all messy and dripping with it.

Fuck, Patrick loves him so much, everything about him from his dick to his stupid captainly heart and his firestarter temperature, even if his skin gets all pink from it.

Jonny pulls out but holds Patrick's legs open so he can watch his own come dribble out of Patrick's hole, and that is just so – narcissistic, and possessive, and typically Jonny, that Patrick wants to laugh, except that the look on Jonny's face is so reverent.

"You are so perfect," Jonny murmurs, still staring at his hole, and then he's got a hand around Patrick's hard cock and the fingers of his other hand inside Patrick. It's making a mess, he's dragging out come with every push-pull of his fingers, but it's so fucking hot that Patrick arches his back, yells, and comes like a teenager, spurting right up to his neck.

Jonny spoons up behind him again when they're done, though Pat knows he can't stay the night; he's sharing a room with David, unfortunately. He wriggles around, turns so he can face Jonny. Jonny's eyes are half-closed; he looks sleepy and pleased and utterly satiated.

"You've got to get back," Patrick says. "Unless you want David to come knocking on my door. I don't think he'd be able to resist me like this, naked and covered in come."

Jonny snorts. "Your fucking ego," he says – which, hey, is kind of unfair coming from him, seeing as he'd just called Patrick perfect ten minutes ago – pulling away reluctantly, sitting up to look for his shit on the floor. "I don’t even know why I – " and then he snaps his mouth shut, turning red.

"Why you what?"

"Nothing," Jonny says, a little too quickly, and Patrick leaves off, feeling slightly confused but too tired to pry further.

Jonny's dressed when he comes back to the bed and looks down at Patrick, that fondness back in his face. "Hey. You know what, you deserve every inch of that trophy."

Patrick smiles and reaches up for his hand. "You know I couldn’t have done it without you helping me out. I meant what I said – you deserve this, Jonny. I don’t know why they gave it to me."

"I told you - because you're just that good." Jonny sits on the bed, and damn, he's probably never going to leave at this rate, wanting to talk and hold Patrick's hand, stroking his thumb over the knuckles. Patrick finds that he really doesn’t mind. He lifts Patrick's hand to his mouth, kisses it gently, drops little kisses on the pads of each finger and the delicate inside of his wrist. It's so sentimental and intimate and so – unlike, and yet like them, at the same time. It's the story of their entire rookie year – fucking, and friendship so close you couldn’t separate them with a piece of paper; and Patrick loving Jonny, and them being just fuck buddies; and all the cuddling, and now this, Jonny lavishing kisses on Patrick's hands, the hands that people called _sweet, magical, soft_ , looking at him in that way that makes Patrick's heart do funny things in his chest.

"I've got to go back to Buffalo for a few weeks," Patrick blurts. "But I was thinking – maybe a month later? I want to go to Winnipeg. I want to see you in the summer."

Jonny stares at him. "You do?" He looks so surprised that Patrick momentarily feels a little insulted. Why is it so hard to believe that Patrick still wants to see him? They're still best friends, aren’t they?

"Why is it so hard to believe that I want to see you?" Patrick says out loud.

"Is the sex that good?" Jonny says. He's smiling, but that easy fondness has gone from his eyes. "You want to go all the way to Winnipeg just so we can fuck? Dude, you don't even like Canada."

"I don't want to just fuck you, I want to actually spend time with you," Patrick snaps. "And I don't like Canada, but I love _you_ , stupid."

Jonny frowns. "What?" he asks, as if he thinks he's heard wrong.

"What _what_?" Patrick says, as snarky as he can sound. "Look, it's fine. I know you don't feel that way, and like, I've totally resigned myself to that fact, man, made my peace with it ages ago. But you're still my best friend, and okay, the sex is maybe kind of great, so yeah. Why can't I visit you in the summer? I promise, I'm not expecting anything back from you."

There is a long, long silence. Jonny's expression doesn’t change at all; his face doesn’t even move, and he's still holding on to Patrick's hand, but the silence grows until Patrick is wishing he'd never said a word. But what the hell, he'd specifically told Jonny he was cool with it, that he didn’t expect anything back. Jonny probably needs some time to process the fact that Patrick's actually dumb enough to fall in love with him

Jonny explodes eventually, like Pat knew he would. "You said we were just fuck buddies!"

Patrick blinks. That is not the reaction he was expecting Jonny to have.

"Yeah? Because, I mean, that's all you think we are, isn’t it? And you agreed that we were."

"I agreed because _you_ said it first, and I thought you really meant it, you asswipe," Jonny snarls.

"Okay, now I'm really confused," Patrick says, blinking up at Jonny.

Jonny growls – actually _growls_ , and then he's dragging Patrick upright, bending down to kiss him. Patrick's even more confused now, but he goes with it, kissing right back, because hey, he's never going to turn down a chance to kiss Jonny.

"You stupid idiot," Jonny says into his mouth, "you dumbass, you time wasting idiot – "

"What the fuck, Toews," Patrick says, pulling back and scowling.

"Do you mean that you've loved me for like, at least this entire season, and you told me we were just fuck buddies because you _thought_ I thought that way?"

"Uh. Yeah? Don't you?"

"No, you dumbass. Did it ever occur to you that maybe I love you too?"

"What the fuck – not cool, Jonny, if you're putting me on, I swear I'm going to kill you and hide your body."

"You dumb fuck," Jonny says, and lurches forward to kiss Patrick again. "Wasting everyone's time, you stupid dumbass – "

Patrick is still dazed and confused when Jonny stops and leans back, looking at him, thumbs pressing into the spots on his cheeks where his dimples are. "Come to Winnipeg whenever you want, asshole. I'll be waiting."

And Patrick – his body catching on and understanding faster than his brain does, somehow, smiles at Jonny, as wide as he can, and feels Jonny's thumbs dip into his dimples.

___

 

_Epilogue_

 

**June 10 2010 | Chicago Tribune**

  
**PATRICK KANE: GOAL SCORER, GAME WINNER, CUP HERO**

_Patrick Kane talks about scoring that game winning goal in overtime and how his game has changed over the years_

 

Patrick Kane is the hero of Chicago after his goal 4 minutes into overtime clinched the Stanley Cup for the Chicago Blackhawks, ending the NHL's longest cup drought of 49 years.

Kane, sometimes affectionately referred to as 'The Flash' by fans due to his super speed ability, once again rose to the occasion in Game Six, showing us exactly why fans name him after the fictional superhero. His game winning goal was a breathtaking glimpse into the way Kane has learned to deploy his ability to devastating effect and use it to complement his play over the years, first collecting the puck precisely on a pass from Brian Campbell and then activating his power so quickly that the Flyers had no time to react.

"There's nothing you can do against someone like Kane," Daniel Briere said after the game. "He's fast, he's slippery, he has phenomenal puck control, whether he uses his super speed or not, any team would still find it hard to hold him. We had no chance against that goal of his. He's probably got the best hands in the NHL right now."

Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews agrees. "I think during his first couple of seasons, he might still have been adjusting to using it at the highest level. But now, he's developed his game so well that he's pretty much an all-rounder, he's learned when to use and not use his ability, at times that will have the best effects, and I think that showed tonight, and this team – this city – would not again be Stanley Cup champions without Patrick Kane."

The man himself, when asked what he thinks about the way his play and his ability have developed along parallel lines, merely laughs and shrugs. "Maybe I had some problems with it at the beginning," he admits. "But now, I'm just happy I contributed to winning the Cup. And it's not just on me, the whole team worked hard. This was a tough season, and everyone did incredibly well. And [Toews] helped me a whole lot, every single step of the way. I wouldn’t be playing the way I do now if it wasn’t for him."

There's much praise for Kane now, from rivals and teammates alike, and the question on everyone's minds now is probably: what next for the diminutive winger whose prodigious skills have managed to silence all naysayers, and win a city the Stanley Cup?


End file.
